


don't go without me

by savage_starlight



Series: and you could have it all, my empire of dirt [4]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Foul Language, Found Family, M/M, Minor but graphic depictions of violence, Mutual Pining, UnDeadwood Mini-series (Critical Role), Western Gothic, character injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2021-01-04 08:57:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21195041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savage_starlight/pseuds/savage_starlight
Summary: A late priest, a race against the clock, a game, and a revelation (or two).(The promised Reverend whump fic to accompany my earlier cruelty toward Clayton. Enjoy.)





	don't go without me

**Author's Note:**

> Five days later, I finally have stopped falling asleep long enough to finish this fic!! Thank you so much to everyone who has commented on the last three - I am utterly BLOWN AWAY by the degree of your support, and it gives me so much joy and so much motivation and I am so grateful.
> 
> This one is, as promised, the whump fic in which I abuse the poor Reverend. This is also, I have discovered, a continuation of the trend where my oneshot fics are slowly creeping their way to the five digit mark, so I'm sorry if the stories I write or the waits between them end up being a bit long. I have at least one more fluff idea I wanna write (two, actually, but only one that I have a solid thought for), but the next fic I publish will actually be a 5+1 prompt fill, so keep an eye out for that. If anyone has any prompts they'd like to see at me, please feel free to hit me up either here or on my writing tumblr, who-gave-atlas-a-pencil.tumblr.com .
> 
> Thank you so much again for the continued feedback and support!! The title of this one comes from the song "C'est la Mort", by the Civil Wars. It is yet another song on my seemingly ever-growing playlist of UnDeadwood songs for shipping and otherwise. I hope you all enjoy!!

Clayton's always been observant. It's a long-standing habit at this point, keeping an eye on people, on places, on anyone and anything that might become a threat to him if he isn't careful. Usually, a perceptive nature is something he's grateful for. 

Then there's days like today. As he listens, mostly unwillingly, the asshole three tables over launches into his fourth account of exactly how incredibly brave he'd been the night before when he'd walked his lady home. With every telling, the story becomes more audacious, and Clayton's not quite sure at this point which is bound to give out first between the man's imagination and his own low tolerance for bullshit. In an attempt to avoid finding out, he tries to tune out the man, focusing on the surroundings, on the weather, on literally anything that isn't that nasally fucking drawl.

For being in such a shithole of a town, the Gem Saloon isn't actually a bad establishment by Clayton's standards. Of course, it isn't immune to the problems that plague everywhere else – floors that have been aged with several years of spilled whiskey, bullet holes in the walls, faint stains on tables that nobody dares to address. In a strange way, Clayton’s almost glad for that. It doesn’t matter how rustic it looks, nothing feels natural here until at least three people have had the piss beaten out of them in the nearby vicinity.

Clayton turns his attention back to the table he’s sitting at. Miriam is on one side of him and Aloysius is on the other, or at least his bad leg is. He’s got it resting on the empty chair where Matthew’s supposed to be sitting, rubbing at the side of his knee as he gestures for another whiskey to be brought around.

Across from him, Arabella checks her watch for the fourth time in as many minutes. “He’s late,” she says, the corners of her mouth tightening. She looks pointedly at Matthew’s chair as if expecting him to appear out of thin air, her frown deepening further when that doesn’t happen.

Clayton sighs. “It’s cleanliness that’s next to godliness, Miss Whitlock, not punctuality. He might have just slept in or got caught up with some shit at the church.” It wouldn’t be the first time he’d forgotten how to use a clock while trying to counsel the whole four citisens of Deadwood who frequented the church outside of a monthly drunken stupor.

“He does run confessions on Saturday mornings,” Miriam points out, her tone dry. “Perhaps he got held up by all the good folk of this town rushing to repent for their sins.” As if to punctuate her point, there’s a sudden commotion in the far corner of the bar as one of the men playing poker stands up suddenly, shouts something about a cheating dealer, then promptly passes out and knocks his head against the table on the way down.

“Likely as that possibility is, if the Reverend don’t show up shortly I may start lookin’ into alternative entertainment,” Aloysius says, raising an eyebrow. Clayton follows his gaze and sees Annabelle on the top floor talking with one of the other girls, fixing her hair with quick and practised movements.

“Jesus,” Clayton mutters, and pushes his chair back. “Let me spare you the trouble, Mister Fogg. I’ll go check on him. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes, if I don’t run into him on the way down there.” The church is a short walk from the Gem Saloon, and most residents of Deadwood know just enough about Clayton to not bother him when they cross him on the street.

“I’ll come with,” Arabella says, to his surprise. She stands up delicately, adjusts her skirt, and holds her notebook to her chest with one arm. “I’d like to see just what is occupying the Reverend’s time so deeply he couldn’t make his way down.”

Clayton’s not quite sure what unholy spirit has possessed Arabella this morning to make her so enthusiastic, but he’s not bothered enough to care. He nods once and tips his hat to the others. “We’ll be back shortly,” he repeats, and leads the way out.

The boardwalk outside is alive with the mid-morning bustle of men striding from one saloon to another, women making their way along with their arms always looped through somebody else’s elbow, heads leaned together in some quiet conspiracy as they share shy grins. “Best we look like we’re together if we don’t want people looking at us,” Arabella says, and winds her arm through Clayton’s. He stiffens briefly but allows the touch to linger, adjusting his own stance to more closely mirror that of the other gentlemen walking about with ladies at their arms. Considering that he’s ominous on a good day and Bella’s both married and richer than Midas, Clayton’s not sure exactly how this is supposed to make them inconspicuous, but he’s long learned that there’s not much point to arguing with Bella.

“Little surprised you decided to come along on this stroll with me, Miss Whitlock,” he says, keeping his voice low as they make their way along. “It’s usually Miriam that has an interest in the affairs of others.”

“Perhaps she’s rubbing off on me,” Arabella suggests, a little too lightly.

Clayton’s eyes narrow. “Likely as that may be, that’s not your only reason. Is it?”

Bella arches an eyebrow. “My, my, Mister Sharpe. You’re certainly in a suspicious mood this morning. Perhaps you should have been the one sleeping in instead of the Reverend.”

“I’m afraid sleepin’ don’t improve my mood much, Miss Whitlock,” Clayton says, and gives up on getting her to answer the question. They make their way to the church without much further conversation, and as they approach he appraises the building with a raised eyebrow. Though the reconstruction effort has recently concluded and some people have started straggling back again, the double doors which usually stand open and welcoming in the warmer months are closed tight.

At his side, Bella breathes in sharply, but when Clayton looks at her she shakes her head. “Let’s just see if he’s in there,” she says, quickening her pace. They cross the street, and Clayton thanks his longer legs as he makes it to the door before Bella and pulls it open. It’s not locked, but far stranger than that, the inside of the church is completely empty. The windows still have their curtains drawn, and the whole place looks like it hasn’t been touched since it was closed up on Friday.

Worse than that, the Reverend is nowhere to be found.

Clayton feels something ominous coil in his guts as he stands in the doorway. Arabella touches his arm, and he sees in her face that same fear reflected. “Let’s check upstairs,” she says, then grabs his hand and starts pulling him after her.

The church door closes loudly and Clayton follows, half-dragged along until he regains his footing. He outpaces Arabella easily, beating her to the top of the stairs where the broken lock on the door catches his eye immediately and sends a spike of cold down his spine. He pushes and the door opens easy, too easy, and he finds himself staring frozen at the contents of Matthew’s room.

The room is a wreck, a stark contrast from every time Clayton’s ever seen it. The sheets are ripped half from the bed, the dresser knocked askew from its normal position by the wall. The bedside table is knocked to the floor, a broken lamp beside it with oil oozing into the floor near a much larger darker stain. Shards of glass and the remains of a shattered bottle glisten in the sunlight through the east window, and Clayton watches them wink up from the floor, mocking.

Bella’s mounted the steps behind him at some point. She stands there now, staring the way he is, taking in the ruin before them. Then she swears softly under her breath. “I’ll go get the others,” she says, and her boots click hurriedly down the stairs.

Clayton takes a step into the room. Then another. Slowly, he bends over to pick up the Bible laying spine-up on the floor, and he brushes it off with more care than he’s done just about anything in his life. He presses the cover closed and holds it tight in his hands and thinks, for Mason’s sake, _May God have mercy on whoever it is that did this, because I fuckin’ won’t._

* * *

By the time Bella makes it back with the others, Clayton’s composed himself again and is in the process of looking for clues. He’s on his hands and knees checking under the bed for anything that might have been kicked under there, and he swears when he comes up empty. He stands just as the door opens again, just in time to see the way Miriam’s face morphs with a horror that doesn’t belong on her otherwise impassive features.

“Goddamn,” Aloysius mutters. “What the hell happened here?”

“Someone took the Reverend, case that wasn’t obvious,” Clayton says, a little too sharp. “Must have been some time last night. Doesn’t look like anyone’s been down in the church today yet.”

Bella is holding onto Miriam’s arm like it’s a lifeline, eyes wide and spooked. “I had a dream last night, like a nightmare, but…I never imagined it might have been real. I don’t understand. Who would do this and why?”

“There’s a lotta people ain’t fond of religious folk,” Aloysius says, running his hand over the splintered wall. “I ain’t ever been up here before on account of the stairs, so one of you is gonna have to fill me in – this wall always like this?”

“No,” Clayton says before anyone else can. “He keeps this place clean.” _It’s cleanliness that’s next to godliness, not punctuality, _he thinks, and what was a wryly amusing remark twenty minutes ago now clouds like smoke in his head.

Aloysius hums. “That means either someone got slammed into this wall real hard, or if we go diggin’ we’re gonna find buckshot. Only two things I can think of that might have happened.”

_What difference does it make?_ Clayton almost snaps, though he stops himself in time. “Point is, he’s missin’, and we need to find him.”

“Agreed,” Miriam says without hesitation. “Arabella and I will ask around to see if anybody saw anything last night. Aly, you said you have some experience in tracking, correct?”

Aly nods, just once. “Sure do, ma’am, and I was just about to put it to use.”

“Excellent. Clayton,” she begins, turning to him.

He doesn’t wait for her to finish. “I’ll get the horses,” he says, and leaves before they can ask any questions.

* * *

They reconvene an hour later back at the church. Clayton is the first to arrive with the exception of Aloysius, who likely never left in the first place. As he approaches with four horses in tow, the other man looks up and waves him over. “Come take a look at this.”

Clayton brings the horses with him and looks at where Aly is pointing. On the ground is a familiar dark stain with dirt kicked over it from hasty scuffles of boots. “Found this in about five other places headin’ that way before I came back,” Aloysius says, nodding to the north. “Somebody was bleedin’ pretty bad, that’s for damn sure.”

“Let’s hope it wasn’t the Reverend,” Clayton says grimly as he starts to tie packs of gear to the back of the horses. Aloysius helps in the efforts without being asked, and grateful as Clayton is for the assistance it doesn’t take long for him to tire of the constant sideways glances he’s receiving. “I got something on my face, Mister Fogg?”

“You mean other than a look like you’re ‘bout to go cut somebody else’s head off? Not at all.” Aloysius pulls on the straps to tighten the pack and gives Clayton a strange look. “It ain’t like you to use your face for expressin’ things, no offense intended.”

“Not sure what else I’m supposed to do with it, Aloysius, but I’ll keep your review in mind.” Clayton gives a final tug to ensure the pack on the last horse is secure and turns just in time to see the ladies crossing the street.

They arrive with a rush in their step and a shadow across both their eyes, and Arabella doesn’t bother with pleasantries. “Jacob Tucker,” she says, sounding faintly winded but otherwise put-together. “That’s who we’re lookin’ for. Jacob C. Tucker.”

“Tucker?” Aloysius echoes. “Ain’t that the tall guy spends his life lookin’ like a cat that ate a sour mouse?”

“The very same,” Miriam confirms. “We encountered his wife down at the Bella Union looking a bit worse for wear. She said the Reverend had intervened in an argument she’d had with her husband that turned physical, and that he’d helped her home after the affair. She said Mister Tucker has had some problems in the past with people getting involved in their relationships and thinks he might have gone after the Reverend as a consequence.”

Aloysius gives a low whistle. “They weren’t jokin’ around when they said money can’t buy class, were they? Thought he was a rich man.”

“He was until he fucked it away,” Arabella says disdainfully. “Pride goes before the fall, or so I’ve heard.”

“Fascinatin’ as this bit of gossip is, I’m more interested in the situation at hand.” Clayton feels an edge of steel slip into his voice, cold and hard. “Miriam, you two hear anything about if he would’ve been in this alone? How many are we lookin’ at dealin’ with here?”

“Madeline – Miss Tucker, that is – said it could have been him on his own, but she has no way of knowing. Apparently her husband has some mighty irritable friends who might have joined him on this venture.”

_Of course he does, _Clayton thinks, his dark mood deepening. “Then it sounds to me like we’re burnin’ daylight. Miss Whitlock, pick a horse.”

* * *

They make good time as they ride, Aloysius taking point so he can keep a better eye on the trail they’re pursuing. Miriam and Arabella take up the middle, and Clayton pulls up the rear, keeping an ever-watchful eye on the road behind them in case anyone decides to follow. The trail behind them stretches out long and cold, and the trail that sprawls ahead of them shows little more promise. Halfway through the day, the sun disappears behind a series of clouds, and by the time they break to water the horses a soft, sleepy drizzle has begun to fall.

Hardly anybody has spoken throughout the ride, but Aloysius and Arabella strike up a quiet conversation when they stop, both of them sitting near each other on a rock as Aly stretches his leg out. Miriam is saying something to her horse in a sweet, low voice, but Clayton doesn’t feel like hearing any of their voices right now. He walks away from the others, taking refuge in the silence about fifty feet away.

It’s much louder when the Reverend is travelling with them. He always has to be friendly, talking to someone or singing some song or panicking about something stupid. Like the time he’d picked a bunch of wildflowers for his room at the church and had found himself set upon by bees the whole way back to town and then some. He’d stared at them like they were live snakes waiting to bite, and Clayton had bit down on a laugh for so long he’d half expected to bruise his ribs with the effort.

The thought doesn’t make him laugh now, or even smile. All it does is dredge up the memory of his room, wrecked and broken, bloodstains on the floor and in the dirt outside and the threat of buckshot buried in the walls. They could be following one man or three, one man or half a dozen, one man or maybe not even that, because with all the fucked up shit he’s seen as of late he wouldn’t be surprised if the Reverend had somehow managed to get himself abducted by the undead or their spectral cousins.

Footsteps approach behind him, soft on the dirt and easily recognizable. Miriam lays a hand gently on Clayton’s elbow as she appears at his side and looks up at him, eyes warm and concerned. “Clayton, darlin’, how are you handling all this?”

It’s a familiar conversation between them at this point, one that never gets far on a good day. “Same way I handle everything, Missus Landisman. By fuckin’ dealing with it.”

“And how’s that going for you?”

“Still here, ain’t I?”

“Best as I can tell.” Miriam’s hand tightens on his arm, just barely. It’s enough to make him look over, and he finds her staring back intently. “Are you alright? Is there anything you need?”

_Five minutes of space and a goddamn drink for starters, _Clayton doesn’t say, his fingers tensing into fists at his side. “I need this to get wrapped up before we end up campin’ in mud,” he says instead. “The others about ready with the horses?”

Something kind and gentle and slightly worried flashes across Miriam’s face for a moment before she smiles, squeezes Clayton’s arm one more time and lets go. “I don’t know but I can certainly check. Would you like to accompany me?”

“Go on ahead,” Clayton says, and watches the rain drip from his hat as he listens to her leave.

* * *

When they pick back up, so does the rain. The drizzle evolves into a steady pour and it isn’t long before they’re all soaked through, thick clothes hanging heavy and wet on their shoulders to add to the misery. Aloysius’s shirt clings to his skin and the ladies keep shivering. They should find shelter, Clayton knows they should find shelter, but every time he thinks about it he glances up and sees the daylight still lingering despite the clouds and he can’t think of anything but pushing forward and through the storm. The rain is fucking with the trail and it’s obvious by the way Aloysius keeps stopping every now and then, and there’s a deep, paranoid part of him that knows that if they stop, they’ll lose the scent entirely.

As if he’s heard Clayton’s thoughts from up ahead, Aloysius draws his horse to a stop and turns around on the saddle. “I got bad news.”

“I’d say such news fits the poor weather,” Miriam says with a faint smile. “What is it?”

“Trail’s gone. Been followin’ a solid guess for about a quarter mile now but that guess ain’t gonna do much for us anymore with this storm messin’ up the tracks.” Aloysius shifts, uncomfortable and awkward in a way Clayton isn’t used to seeing out of him. “If the Reverend ain’t been in a position to leave us a trail of breadcrumbs, goin’ after him’s about to get mighty hard.”

There is a look that passes between them all, silent and heavy. It’s a look of resignation and a quiet sort of hopeless dread. Bella is the first one to speak. “So what do we do then? Do we keep looking for him until the light gives out? Should we look for shelter?”

“I’d say we should look for fuckin’ breadcrumbs,” Clayton says, glaring from under the brim of his hat. “Unless they just disappeared into the sky a quarter mile back, they had to have left something. You folks want to find shelter, you can be my guest.”

“Or we could all go together to avoid losing you as well, Mister Sharpe,” Miriam suggests. “If the trail isn’t leading us anywhere further at the moment, perhaps we need to seek… alternative means of figuring out what we need to know.”

Well aware of what she’s referring to, Clayton bristles. Even after all their successes in playing the game, all they’d learned about the risks and rewards, he still feels like every time one of them draws from that goddamn deck of cards they’re playing with fire. “I don’t have much interest in the prospect of playin’ poker with a figure that bets our souls on a good day, and I certainly don’t care to do it today.” _He’s done it for you, _a voice whispers traitorously in the back of his mind, and Clayton shushes it back with a great deal of effort.

“We’re of no use to anyone drenched and exhausted, Clayton,” Miriam snaps. “Now instead of walkin’ the next however many miles in hopes that you’ll see something useful closer to the ground, why don’t you come with us to come up with a plan that might actually be of some use?”

There’s a steely edge to her voice that makes Clayton sit up taller, every muscle growing tense. They’re all looking at him, and they’re all right, and he fucking _knows it_ but there’s a cold fear tying knots in his guts that he doesn’t dare to name. It’s making him foolish, making him act stupid and reckless and he hates it but he’s not sure what else to do in this moment.

Clayton closes his eyes and blows out a long, slow breath. He thinks of the Reverend, of bloodstains on wood, of kind dark eyes looking down at him or maybe up or maybe looking nowhere at all ever again, and something sick and painful and entirely, completely unwelcome clenches in his chest.

He’s such a goddamn fool.

Clayton clenches the reins so tight he can see his knuckles through his skin. “There was a cave not far back,” he says flatly, and turns his horse around to lead the way.

* * *

The cave, as it turns out, is not only cold and hard and cavelike, but entirely uncomfortable on top of that and somehow stuffy despite the chill. Clayton hates it the minute they step into it, and he positions himself by the opening, just out of the rain. The others burrow further in, with Aloysius managing to get a fire going to dry them out somewhat while the ladies wrap blankets around themselves.

Clayton doesn’t bother. He sits at the mouth of the cave and watches the grey sky start to darken, the muted sun slipping closer and closer to the horizon as the rain continues to fall in sheets. It’ll be dark soon enough, and then they’ll be searching for tracks by lantern light if they’re searching for them at all.

If there’s even anything to find. The thought settles like a stone in his belly, and not for the first time Clayton finds himself reaching for the pocket of his duster for courage. Instead of the usual flask he keeps there, his fingers brush against a string of beads, and he pulls it out carefully, examining it in the slowly dimming light.

The Reverend’s rosary is well-loved, soft grooves worn into the wood of the cross where his thumb so often rests. He keeps this thing polished and in clean condition, same as he does everything in his room, treats it like it’s sacred. Clayton had found it in the middle of a boot-print with a crack down two of the beads.

He wraps the string around his hands and closes his eyes, leaning his head against his hands. He’s a goddamn fool. He’s known it for months now, known it since the first time he jumped to Mason’s aid when the smarter thing would have been running. Nobody stays on the green side of the grass by giving a fuck about others.

All the same – and he hates to admit it, hates to even think it, the admission like acid in his brain – these last few months have been good. He’s kept out of sight and out of mind of most like he always does, but there’s been four people who have seen him and haven’t given a rat-fuck one about what they found. For all her differences of opinion and status and stature and every other fucking element of her being, even Arabella has stayed and become dear to him in a way no heavenly or earthly father ever has.

His fingers clutched tight around the cross of a God he can’t make himself believe in, Clayton thinks of the Dealer, faceless and fearless and cold and everything he’s ever tried to be, everything he’s ever tried to escape. He thinks of the Dealer, and he thinks, _I know your face, you fucker. I know how you play, and it ain’t fair._

Then again, nothing is. Clayton isn’t a gambler and never has been, but there is one thing he knows for certain: if you can’t beat the odds, you don’t keep playing the ground. You change the game.

_How would you like to dispel your hate?_ a voice whispers, soft in the back of his head.

Clayton stands and flexes his fingers once, twice. He tucks the rosary in the pocket of his duster, casts one last look at the still darkening sky and realises the rain has finally started to slow. That’ll make things much easier, he expects. Miriam's right. He knows what he has to do.

He walks further into the cave, sits by Aloysius without prelude, and asks him for a deck of cards.

The Dealer smiles. Clayton doesn’t.

_Come on, you son of a bitch. Let’s play a game._

* * *

_He’s thrown over the back of a horse, tied hand and foot. Everything aches, and he’s cold and wet and chilled down to the bone. If he had time, he thinks he could work his way out of the ropes and make a run for it, but he can’t feel his legs and he has no time. What he has is blood crusted into his hair, and nearly excruciating pain in his shoulder, and four men on four horses around him, and not a snowball’s chance in hell of getting out unless they have a change of heart._

_If he tilts his head just right, he can almost see it, the tree they keep mentioning that sits atop a hill in this otherwise flat landscape. Attached to the side of each horse, he also sees rope._

* * *

Clayton comes back to himself feeling colder than before. He shakes the spectral chill of the Dealer from his brain and shoves himself to his feet.

Miriam had watched him deal his hand, and she’s beside him in an instant. “What is it, Clayton? What did you see?”

He pulls out of her grip and makes a beeline for the entrance, calling over his shoulder as he goes. “Aloysius, get that fire out, and get it out now. They’re gonna hang him. We have to move.”

They’re back on their horses within five minutes, and this time Clayton takes point. He’s not sure what it is that’s driving him, but somewhere inside, somehow, he knows where to go this time, even after they reach the point where the trail has run out and Aloysius said they were running on a guess. He digs his heels into the side of his horse and the others follow suit, picking up their pace and following his lead because even though he's a goddamn fool, it seems like they are too.

Though she’s riding toward the back, it’s Arabella who sees the tree first, high on a hill like a beacon. She points it out and Clayton sucks in a breath when he sees how close they are, how far away it feels despite that.

He remembers four people with guns in his vision, but at this distance he can’t see any of them, not even their horses. For all he knows, they’re already halfway up the other side of the hill on their way to the tree, but if he rides hard enough, he might make it to them before they get to the top. There’s four people with guns, and one of him, and it’s a terrible idea but – well. He’s faced worse odds.

“Keep up or catch up,” he calls, and kicks his horse faster. The others fall away behind him, and he holds his hat on his head with one hand and holds the reins of the horse in the other and thinks, _We’re coming, we’re coming, I’m coming._

* * *

Clayton dismounts nearly twenty minutes later at the bottom of the hill and leaves his horse there munching on some grass, her sides heaving with effort. “Good girl,” he whispers, patting her neck before leaving her to graze.

He slips up the trail, following the hoof prints to the top. He hears the men before he sees them, a group of voices hollering with a drunken slur to their words and every sentence punctuated by profanity. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ, Cooper, hold that fuckin’ horse steady,” one of them hollers. “You’re shakin’ like a whore in church.”

“We do this right and there’s gonna be a lot more whores in church real soon,” another calls back. There’s a chorus of laughter, then an all-too familiar grunt of pain. “We just gotta take out some trash first, ain’t that right, boys?”

Clayton mounts the hill and hides in some scrub brush, making hasty use of the shadows that have now stretched across the landscape. Four lanterns and a silver moon are the only sources of light, but what they show is enough to turn his stomach.

His momentary glimpse through the Reverend’s eyes had been enough to prepare him for the sight of the four fuckers who took him, the way they hold themselves with mean sets to their jaws and stained clothes like they’ve spent the last six months curled up in a pile of shit. But the disgust that curls his lip at the sight of them is nothing on the horror that settles in his gut when he sees the Reverend.

He’s a fucking mess and that’s putting it polite. He’s got deep purple bruises peppered across his face, dried blood streaked all the way down his chin from a split lip and what looks to be a broken nose. There’s a dark stain across the shoulder of his vestments, and his hands are tied together in front of him as he sits on a horse that one man is holding steady. Two other fuckers are passing a bottle and laughing as they watch him sit there, slumped and in pain. The fourth fucker is in a tree trying with shaking hands to tie off a rope. One end is up in the tree with him. The other is around the Reverend’s neck.

Something calm takes Clayton then, and he doesn’t hesitate. He springs up from behind the shrubs, aims one pistol at the fucker in the tree, and lets off a shot that goes right through his shoulder. He screams as he lets go, and as the rope falls to the ground he follows it down when Clayton puts a second round in his left eye-socket and turns the rest of the barrels onto the other three.

Three things happen very quickly then. The first is that the horse the Reverend is sitting on rears up in panic and sends him sprawling off its back. The second is that Clayton puts two holes in each of the skulls of the other two assholes who chose to join on this venture. The third is that Jacob C Tucker himself hauls the Reverend up from the ground, pulls him in front of his body like a shield, and puts a pistol to the side of his skull.

Clayton freezes, his gun trained on Tucker’s forehead, eyes flashing to the way the Reverend’s face twists up with pain. “Who the fuck are you?” Tucker growls, upper lip curling back over half-rotten teeth.

“Think of me as an interested party with a…vested concern for the safety of the man you’re tryin’ to do in right now,” Clayton says, keeping his hand steady.

“Oh, you’re concerned for him, are you? Worried about this fine, Bible-thumpin’ shit stain?” Tucker shakes the Reverend and digs the barrel of his gun in deeper, and Clayton watches with dawning horror as the Reverend groans and tries to open his eyes. “He’s wakin’ up. You wanna have a chat and confess your sins before I blow his brains out? I’m a kind man, I’ll allow that.”

Clayton doesn’t respond, instead staring at the Reverend’s– no, Matthew’s face. It’s mangled and twisted with pain, and when he finally manages to open the eye that isn’t swollen shut it takes a long minute before he seems to focus. If he’s supporting his weight at all, he’s doing it barely, and though he looks like he’s got to be in the kind of pain most men would rather be unconscious for he struggles to straighten until he’s stopped by the arm around his neck. His eyes are dark and kind and gorgeous and he doesn’t belong here, he never has.

His lips move, but no sounds come out. “You’re fuckin’ chokin’ him,” Clayton snaps.

“That so? You want me to put him down faster?”

“It’ll be the last thing you fuckin’ do.”

Tucker laughs. “It’ll be the last thing I do no matter what. Unless I’ve missed my guess, Mister Interested Party, you’re not gonna let me walk away.”

“You ask real nice and you might get to crawl,” Clayton growls, cocking his gun.

“That’s mighty kind of you,” Tucker drawls, “but unlike our dear friend here, I ain’t one for livin’ on my knees. I’d rather go out with a bang.” His finger tightens on the trigger.

A shot goes off, two shots, three, four of them at once, all of them accompanied by an echoing boom as the guns go off. Tucker sprawls backward across the ground with a spray of blood as three separate rounds fired from behind Clayton blow his face and most of his head clean off his shoulders.

He turns just in time to see Aloysius and Arabella lower their guns with a sharp nod. Then he sees their faces twist with horror. “The Reverend,” Arabella breathes, and Clayton doesn’t even think before he drops his guns and runs toward the familiar man laying on the ground in an alarmingly large puddle of blood. He looks too intact to have had his brains blown out, to be dead, but the seconds it takes to cross the distance pass far too slowly as Clayton drops to his knees in the middle of the blood and rolls the Reverend over.

There’s a deep, bloody graze along his temple from a bullet that had once had a much more permanent trajectory, and this close his face looks even more fucked up than it had at a distance. For a moment, he’s motionless, and Clayton feels the blood freeze in his veins.

Then his face twitches and he breathes, shallow and heavy, and the world starts again. “Jesus H. fuckin’ Christ, Matthew,” Clayton mutters, half breathless himself. “You are about the luckiest motherfucker to ever step foot in Deadwood, you know that? Aly,” he calls, then finds the other man is already there with his Bowie knife at the ready, sawing through the rope still keeping Matthew’s wrists bound while Clayton loosens the now-bloodied noose and throws it as quick and hard as possible in the first direction he sees.

He’s got Matthew’s head in his lap, and he feels the way the injured man’s frame shakes with heavy, racking coughs as he tries to breathe again, his eyelids flickering. Before he even realises he’s doing it, Clayton’s running his fingers through Matthew’s short hair, the closest thing to comfort he knows.

His eyes open, focusing hazily on Clayton’s face. Even full of pain like this, they’re still one of the prettiest things Clayton’s ever seen. “Clay?” Matthew slurs, his voice rasping like a file. “’s that you, Clay?’

Clayton nods once, short and small. “The very same.” He rubs his thumb gently over the Reverend’s shoulder, the one not covered in blood. “You’re a fuckin’ mess, Matt. You look like five miles of fried shit.”

“’s it only five? Coulda sworn it…felt like eight at least.” Matthew shifts and cries out, the noise fading into a low groan.

“Don’t fuckin’ move, you idiot,” Clayton says, holding him still. “Let Bella take a look at you. We can handle things from here.”

“Mm,” Matthew says, then squints. “Tucker?”

“Dead as a doornail three times over, Rev,” Aloysius says as he approaches, bending over a bit awkwardly to be in line of sight. “He ain’t comin’ back in any form, that’s for damn sure.”

“Mm,” Matthew repeats. “And Miss Tucker?”

“Safe and recoverin’ at the Bella Union, same as you left her,” Clayton says, not quite sure where Matthew’s finding the energy to worry about anyone else when he’s in such a state himself.

“Good.” Matthew’s eyes fall shut again as he smiles, pained and faint. “That’s real good.”

An irrational panic seizes Clayton, and though he knows Matt should probably be sleeping, that he’s been through enough these past few days to make anyone tired, he shakes him as gentle as he can. “Don’t go to sleep on us, you fuckin’ idiot,” he says. “I know two ladies you ain’t gonna like scorned.”

“Miriam’s here too?” Matthew murmurs, his eyebrows furrowing.

Clayton snorts softly and shakes his head in disbelief. “You think we woulda gotten away with leavin’ her behind? Not in this lifetime.” He sees the ladies cresting the hill, and he squeezes Matthew’s shoulder as hard as he dares. “We all came, Matt. We’re here.”

* * *

In the end, they decide to spend the night right where they are rather than attempting to move Matthew in his current state. While Bella and Miriam work on getting him bandaged and cleaned up to some vaguely sufficient level, Clayton teams up with Aloysius to deposit the four bodies unceremoniously over the side of the hill. A while ago, they might have been worried about leaving anybody unburied for long, but that problem has seemingly resolved itself for now and Clayton expects there are several buzzards who will be happy about that fact come breakfast time.

They’re resting now, taking turns on watch shifts. Aloysius and Bella are sleeping first on account of leg troubles and poor sleep the previous night, respectively, which leaves Miriam and Clayton awake in a comfortable quiet. He knows he should be exhausted, thinks distantly that he probably is, but somehow Clayton doesn’t feel tired, or at least not tired enough to sleep.

“How you holdin’ up, honey?” Miriam asks for the second time that day, only this time it’s a lot less worried, and he’s nowhere near as angry.

Clayton shrugs with one shoulder and gives a quick jerk of his head. “Still here,” he says, “same as before.”

“So is he,” Miriam says, looking at the Reverend with a mixture of fondness and concern in her eyes. Even after they’d cleaned off all the blood, he’s still a far sight from his usual decorum. Clayton thinks his nose may be crooked the rest of his life, unless one of them breaks it again and sets it right this time, and he suspects the Reverend may have another scar or two to add to his collection of so-called shaving incidents.

Clayton thinks he’ll deck anyone who gives him shit about it. It’s an overprotective urge, and it’ll probably pass in a few days, but he feels that way now. “I know,” he says by way of response, and runs a hand over Matthew’s hair again, careful not to wake him.

“He’ll be recovering for a few days yet,” Miriam says. “Bella got that knife wound in his shoulder cleaned up alright, but I don’t think the doctor or anybody else can expect sermons out of him for a week or so.”

“He tries to do shit before Wednesday and I’ll kick his ass up between his eyebrows myself,” Clayton says, only half joking.

“I’ll join you in that venture,” Miriam offers, and her smile is warm and golden in the light. Clayton returns it for a moment, then watches as the smile fades into something more wistful. “You mean a lot to him. To all of us.”

Clayton looks away, suddenly ashamed when he thinks of his behavior throughout most of the day. “Not sure why that is, but I appreciate the thought.”

Miriam reaches out and takes the hand not in Matthew’s hair, clasping it for a moment between both of hers. “You’re a good man, Clayton,” she says, squeezing gently when he snorts. “You are. You’re both good men. And he loves you too.”

Clayton’s eyes shoot up to meet Miriam’s and he understands, very quickly, how it must feel to be a deer staring down the barrel of a gun. But there is no judgment in her eyes, only a gentle understanding, and he thinks he knows now what it is that he keeps glimpsing when Miriam looks at Bella and she isn’t looking back. Though he pulls away slightly, she holds his hand tighter and doesn’t let go. “There’s a lot of awful things in this world, Mister Sharp, in this place and many others. I’m glad to see some good in all this darkness.”

Clayton swallows hard around the unfamiliar sensation of grief in his throat and nods, just slightly. “That’s mighty kind of you,” he manages after a long time, a roughness to his voice that hasn’t been there in many, many years. “Thank you.”

Miriam smiles, faint but real. “Oh, Clayton, honey. There’s nothing to thank.”

* * *

“What part of ‘stay in bed’ do you have such a hard fuckin’ time comprehending?”

At the front of the church, Matthew jumps about six feet in the air and says something entirely inappropriate for the setting as he turns around, his expression a perfect mirror of the guilty innocence Clayton sees on the faces of children sometimes. “Clayton,” he says warmly. “This is a surprise. You aren’t normally the churchgoing type.”

“I’d say you aren’t normally the idiot type either, but I think it’s a sin to lie on holy ground,” Clayton drawls, uncrossing his arms and stepping away from the doorway where he’s been lurking for at least fifteen minutes now. “You tryin’ to tear those stitches or what? Do you just like having fucked up ribs?”

“I- no, not exactly?” Matthew has the nerve to look almost conflicted, and Clayton rolls his eyes. _You’re a fuckin’ idiot,_ he doesn’t say, not just because he’s pretty sure he’s said it before and Matt knows, but because at this point it’s comforting in a very strange way, knowing that this hasn’t changed him.

Of course, it might have been nice if all the shit that happened had at least made him a little more attuned to when people had been staring at him silently for twenty minutes or better, but- well. Baby steps, Clayton supposes. It’s the best he’s going to get.

“Well, since you’re so intent on walking around, you wanna go upstairs?” Clayton asks, leaning against a pew. “Think we finally got everything put back together the way you had it, if you’d like to verify.”

“That sounds wonderful. I’ve not actually been upstairs at all since- well, that.” Matthew’s smile flickers.

Clayton frowns. “That’s fair enough, I’d say. You sure about doing it now?”

“Of course.” Matt smiles fully again, and it only looks a little forced. “It’s not as if it can be worse than facing down the reanimated corpse of Wild Bill Hickock, right?”

Clayton snorts softly and shakes his head as he holds open the door. “Suppose not.” Matthew leads the way up the stairs, still favouring his left leg slightly, and Clayton follows on his heels. The door frame and lock are both fixed now, but they aren’t secured and the door opens easily to reveal the Reverend’s room.

It’s not perfect, not that anybody had expected it to be, but the furniture has been put back where it was, the oil lamp re-situated on the bedside table. What stains could be cleaned have been, and those that were stubborn have been concealed.

Clayton watches Matthew’s face as he walks in and goes straight to the wall, the one that had been splintered and scraped to hell in whatever tussle had gone down. Over the remnants of that tussle, a few empty frames now hang expectantly.

Matthew turns, looking at Clayton with a raised eyebrow. “These are new,” he observes, sounding confused.

Clayton clears his throat. “They were Bella’s idea. She seems to think it’d be a good idea for us to try to have pictures done up at some point, thought you might have the most interest in them. It’s a suggestion, of course, not a requirement, but she insisted on putting the frames up anyway.”

“But there’s four of them.”

Clayton shrugs. “Four of them, four of us. Figured it would be easier than attempting to get everyone together in one normal picture, and we didn’t expect you wanted a picture of yourself up.” He catches the strange look in Matthew’s eye and frowns. “What, did you want one?”

“No, not at all,” Matthew says. “I just didn’t expect you to be receptive to the idea of pictures if it could be avoided. They’re very…permanent. Correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s a status you seem to avoid.”

“Yeah, well. I’d also like to avoid being shot by Miss Whitlock, so it seemed wiser to agree,” he mutters. “While we’re on the subject of things I’d like to avoid, I’d like to show you something.” Clayton crosses the room and puts his hand on the back of the chair he’d hauled up here late last night when sleep hadn’t been coming easy. “This,” he says, “is also a new fixture.”

Matthew’s eyebrows furrow. “I’d noticed that but….it’s a chair.”

“No shit. Watch this.” Matthew closes the door, locks it, and jams the chair underneath the handle of the door the way he does every night, then steps back. “This is how you lock your fuckin’ door if you don’t want some jackass to just break off the actual lock and let themselves in again. Got it?” Matthew nods slowly, and Clayton grunts. “Good,” he mutters, and unjams the door. “Glad we got that established. Now hold out your hand.”

“For what?” Matthew says, even as he follows the order.

“This.” Clayton reaches into his pocket and pulls out the rosary, by now a familiar weight on his person, and presses it into Matthew’s palm, curling his fingers around it. He watches as Matthew opens his hand to look at it, his eyebrows furrowing with confusion and wonder. “Found that on the floor, when all this started. Thought you’d want it back.”

Matthew holds the rosary like it’s something precious, turning it over slowly in both his hands. “I’d thought this was lost,” he says softly after a long silence, closing his fingers back around it. He looks back up to meet Clayton’s eyes and nods, just once. “Thank you, Clay. Truly.”

Clayton looks away the way he always does and clears his throat. “Ain’t nothin’ you need to thank me for. Just try not to get yourself into this sorta mess again. I don’t want you goin’ missin’ with our pictures hangin’ over your bed. People in this town ain’t smart enough to reach an accurate conclusion and I think my neck’s long enough without stretching it on a rope.”

“Of course.” Matthew tucks the rosary back in his pocket and looks around the room, his eyes settling on the chair, the re-arranged furniture, the empty frames. “I quite like the changes in here,” he says. “You did well.”

Clayton snorts, but touches the brim of his hat in acknowledgment anyway. “I just moved shit,” he says, his smile faint as he opens the door to the afternoon sun. “Now come on, it’s almost lunch. The others’ll be waitin’ and we shouldn’t be late.”


End file.
